A novel method for analyzing the effect of dust accumulation on energy efficiency loss in photovoltaic (PV) system

A novel analysis method for energy efficiency loss is proposed in this paper, which is used to evaluate the effect of dust accumulation in PV system, quantitatively. Considering the nonlinear power generation characteristic of PV panels at low irradiance (below 200-300 W/m(2)), the coupling model of dust concentration and photoelectric conversion efficiency (DC-PCE) is established. To determine the selection range of unknown parameters (saturation irradiance, influence coefficient of dust accumulation) in the model, a PV power generation experiment with six representative dust pollutants (ash, laterite, stone dust, sandy, coal powder and cement) is designed. According to experimental fitting data, the saturation irradiance and corresponding standard deviation of influence coefficient for the six pollutants are given. Eventually, the effectiveness of the model is verified by using ash in natural conditions. Results show that the proposed model has excellent generalization ability and the accuracy is 83.12%. It offers a simple and reliable tool for evaluating the degree of dust accumulation on site. (C) 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

A novel analysis method for evaluating the impact of dust accumulation in PV systems is proposed in this paper. Through experiments, the model parameters are determined and the accuracy and practicality of the model are verified.